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No evidence for increased transmissibility from recurrent mutations in SARS-CoV-2 – Nature

We do not identify a single recurrent mutation in this set convincingly associated with increased viral transmission. Instead, recurrent mutations currently in circulation appear to be evolutionary neutral and primarily induced by the human immune system via RNA editing, rather than being signatures of adaptation. At this stage we find no evidence for significantly more transmissible lineages of SARS-CoV-2 due to recurrent mutations.

https://web.archive.org/web/20201125121534/https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19818-2

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News

Coronavirus is weakening, could die out on its own without a vaccine and patients now survive infections that would have killed them at start of the pandemic, claims Italian expert – Daily Mail

Professor Matteo Bassetti said he is convinced the virus is ‘changing in severity’ and patients are now surviving infections that would have killed them before.

And if the virus’s weakening is true, Covid-19 could even disappear without a for a vaccine by becoming so weak it dies out on its own, he claimed. 

Professor Bassetti suggests this could be because of a genetic mutation in the virus making it less lethal, because of improved treatments, or because people are not getting infected with such large doses because of social distancing. 

But other scientists have hit back at the claims in the past and said there is no scientific evidence that the virus has changed at all.

At the start of June, in response to Professor Bassetti’s claim, Dr Angela Rasmussen, from Columbia University, tweeted: ‘There is no evidence that the virus is losing potency anywhere.’ 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8444151/Coronavirus-withered-aggressive-tiger-wild-cat-Italian-scientist-claims.html